


Darling

by blueberrysconesandfolkmusic



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Friendship/Love, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Multi, MultiSaku - Freeform, One Shot, Polyamory, Some Crack
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-15
Updated: 2020-12-15
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:07:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,124
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28086684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blueberrysconesandfolkmusic/pseuds/blueberrysconesandfolkmusic
Summary: The desert gets lonely at night; Sakura finds one more body to warm her. ‘Sasori sat up with a huff and flicked Sakura on the forehead. "Has it ever occurred to you that you might have a savior complex?’’’
Comments: 5
Kudos: 13





	Darling

Gaara regretted his lack of shoes as he descended down the old, rickety stairs that led to the puppet masters quarters. He was half dressed in his linen-white Kazekage robes, and they trailed behind him like a veil as he walked down into the dark.

There was a sharp click of a tongue as Gaara reached the bottom. "Watch yourself, you're about to step on Chi."

Gaara's sand quickly created a barrier between his bare foot and the elderly fennec fox tearing at a mouse carcass on the ground below the stairs. Sasori's pet did not like the Kazekage in the least, so it was with care that Gaara made his way over to Sasori's desk. The puppet master was carving empty eyes into a wooden skull.

"I just received word that they have found her squad," Gaara tucked his hands into his sleeves, glancing down as Chi hissed at him, " all dead...Sakura not among them."

Sasori reached up to the magnifying glass attached to his eye and removed it, not even blinking once as his vision adjusted. "She was to be back by sunrise." His voice was as dry as sand when he spoke. "Sakura knows better than to keep me waiting. Something truly awful has undoubtedly happened to her, as I warned you it would."

Carefully, Gaara placed a hand on Sasori's slender shoulder. "I sent not only many of the village's finest nin to find her and her squad, but also Temari and Kankuro. I am doing all I can."

Sasori simply whistled. Chi came bounding over, eager to be picked up and placed onto his lap. The fur around the old fox's mouth was wet with sticky blood.

"I should never have spoken about Deidera with that foolish little girl."

Gaara sighed in a bone deep sort of way. "Reconnaissance had to be done on the Akatsuki, Sasori. I'd rather she hadn't have gone on the mission without my permission, but you know how Sakura is. No one could have stopped her, not even you."

There were a few zip ties scattered on Sasori's desk next to his favored bird skull. He used the zip ties mostly to hold materials together, but also on the occasional person when his less...tasteful skills were in order. "We could find a way."

Gaara sat down on the bench next the kindred soul, and folded his arms on the table, his bare toes curling into the old cloak patterned with red clouds discarded on the ground. He pressed his palms together and lowered his forehead to rest on the tops of his fingertips, eyelids fluttering closed. "She will be home soon, Sasori."

* * *

Deidara stumbled down into the endless, merciless sand and clutched Sakura's limp body closer to his chest as he took the brunt of the fall on his knees.

He was thirsty, every splinter in every bone hurt and Sakura was dying slowly in his arms. Deidara was ready to cry from frustration but settled for a scream that tore apart what remained of his throat and sent a nearby lizard rushing away to burrow into the sand.

Deidara closed his eyes, trying to blink away the dust in them, and thought of his...friend. He had spoken to Sasori only once since they had parted ways the day Gaara was killed.

It was in a quiet inn in a quiet town, a night away from the village of the sand. The Akatsuki had stared at each other for a moment before Deidara had poked a nail into Sasori's now soft cheek with a bemused "hn", as he sat down at his old partner's table.

_Sasori smiled soothingly and swatted the blondes hand away. "Isn't it terribly poetic that the very woman who helped to end my life has now given me a chance to live it?" The man pulled the collar of the black shirt he was wearing down low enough so Deidara could see the scar in the shape of a sakura petal over Sasori's…heart._

" _That little girl, hn." Deidara knocked back a cup of sake, then coughed roughly in a way that seemed to hurt his ribs. "A little clay bird_ had _told me the Kazekage had found himself some pets. Hn."_

_Sasori took a drink of green tea flavored with mint and sugar. "Funny, I do remember a little bird flying around...shame she got stuck under the toe of my boot."_

" _What are you doing here, Deidara?"_

_Deidara's face seemed to fall behind his golden bangs, and he stood a little too quickly, knocking the glass he had been drinking from off the table with a bone-aching shatter. "Pein...he wants -"_

" _Are you all right, Sasori?" Both men turned to find Sakura. She was standing with her arm hooked through Gaara's elbow, but the woman reached out her other hand to touch Sasori's arm._

" _Yes, Sakura."_

" _I was just saying hello to my man Sasori here, hn," Deidara said with a twitchy smirk, winking at Gaara and the sand rustling around his feet. "Wish I could stay for a cup of tea, but Pein-sama is a_ slave driver _when it comes to work."_

_Sakura smiled in a way that made Deidara wince, but her voice was light when she said, "have a safe journey, Deidara! Let's go, you guys."_

_She dragged the redheads away by the sleeves of their flowy shirts. Two pairs of bright and wary eyes watched her back as they left the inn._

" _Are you all right?" Sakura whispered once they were out the doors, and Sasori shook his head._

_Gaara was quiet. He tightened his grip on Sakura. "Sasori?"_

_Sasori smiled grimly and mouthed a word that made Gaara's sand rise up around them like a protective embrace._

_**Torture.** _

Deidara had not spoken of meeting them to the Akatsuki leader in an attempt to protect the girl. Now he wanted to shake the limp woman in his arms for being foolish enough to seek the Akatsuki out when she was the very person they wanted the most. When he saw her gagged and bound in the hideout, he had to leave the room to keep from slapping her face with a scream. He was instructed later to deliver the girl's beaten, ruined corpse to her own front door for Sasori and Gaara to find.

Deidara had lasted 3 days and one night of Hidan having his way with Sakura.

" _Get up, hn. Come on," Deidara whispered, wrapping his cloak around her bruised body._

" _...Deidara...what're you...doing?"_

" _I guess I'm fucking defecting, hn."_

" _Deidara…"_

"Deidara."

He blinked away the dizziness from dehydration and shifted to look at Sakura's face. Her hand was entangled in his sweaty mat of hair, and she was looking away from him.

Deidara raised his head to find a kunai pointed at his neck.

* * *

"Kazekage, Sasori-sama."

Both men blinked sleepily from their bed where they were cuddled up together. They did not normally seek each other out but they didn't have Sakura with them tonight, and the nights were difficult.

"It had better be something unholy at this hour," Sasori sighed into the pillows, as Gaara sat up and tried to make himself look presentable.

"I've been sent by Temari and Kankuro." The servant's eyes sparkled. "Sakura has been recovered."

Both men scrambled out of bed at the news, flinging the sheets away and onto the floor with graceless abandon. The servant screamed in horror and darted from the room at the sight of them. Bemused, they looked at each other.

"We sleep naked," Sasori realized.

Gaara covered his face in mortification. "We sleep naked!"

"It doesn't matter. Sakura is home now."

* * *

They arrived in flowing robes and loose white pants to see Sakura tucked into bed in their medical wing. In another bed, Deidara seemed in good spirits despite the chakra suppressor on his wrist; he was chatting happily with Sakura from his mattress about pottery. Kankuro looked a little dazed by the conversation.

Gaara hugged Temari briefly before seeping around the bed and sitting down on the chair one of the nurses had hastily retrieved for him without even saying thank you. Sasori just knelt on the floor, ignoring his old partner behind him.

"Never again, Sakura," Gaara said breathlessly, after a moment of relieved silence. "You are never going on another mission without Sasori or I accompanying you."

Sasori took her hand, frowning at the bruises on his before bringing her fingers to his lips. "Or perhaps you shall never go on a mission again, period."

Sakura rolled her eyes. "Don't be dramatic, you two.," her voice sobered. "I just got a little beat up, unlike everyone else on my squad..."

There was cough from the other bed as Deidara swatted away the agitated sand circling around the room. "A little beat up, hn! You were tortured, girl. Does your _stomach_ look a little beat up, hn?"

Sakura whipped her head around towards the blonde as Sasori moved to pull up her hospital gown, and Gaara stood as a sort of human dressing screen.

'You piece of shit,' she mouthed. Deidara held up his hands and the mouths on his palms stuck their tongues out. But then he suddenly looked away with a sharp breath. Taking the silent cues, Gaara's siblings took their leave with the nurses to try and give them some privacy.

飛段 (Hidan) had been carved into the soft, tender skin just above Sakura's crotch with her very own kunai knife. The rest of Akatsuki had watched while Hidan did it, his other hand in his pants. Deidara swallowed the vomit that came up at the memory.

"Boys," Sakura whispered. "My boys." It was like they were candles left on a drafty window sill, the light gone from their eyes.

Gaara's voice could only be described as raw when he finally spoke, "Sakura, you are never to leave our sides. That is an order from your Kazekage, and you will not disobey me ever again." His kohl lined eyes closed. "Next time there will be consequences."

"I...," she began, but was a little frightened when he smiled with his teeth. "Yes, Kazekage."

* * *

A few weeks found them lounging in the living room on floor pillows, enjoying dried but juicy dates, and open windows. Sakura lay with her knees up, and Gaara mirrored her. Sasori lounged on his side with his head propped up while Deidara dozed on his back a few feet away from the trio, arching like a cat in the sun. Chi was curled up beside him, having taken a mysterious liking to the artist.

They were all topless, including Sakura; she was allowing the wounds she had received on her breasts to have some air, however hot and dry it may have been.

"Are you going to stay here in the sand village, Deidara?" Sakura asked, biting into a date.

The blonde peeked open an eye to look at her. "Do you want me to?"

Sakura smiled sadly. His bare chest was pale in comparison to the more desert-tanned red heads (though even they were still pale by sand village standards), which made the old wounds stand out like lands on a map.

"Yes. I need _someone_ around who won't have a heart attack if I stub my toe." She was already on the upswing, and back to slaving away at the hospital...much to her knights consternation. Gaara and Sasori frowned at Sakura, since the jab was obviously pointed at them.

Deidara pushed his body up and crawled over to where Sakura was resting. He propped himself on his elbows above her lap and smirked, "guess i have to stay then, hn."

She didn't need to know that he wasn't any less solicitous then the other two men were. Deidara was going with the others to find Hidan tonight, once Sakura was asleep with Gaara's stuffed bear in her arms.

A poisoned needle through the neck, suffocation from a blanket of unforgiving sand, and then...boom.

With Deidara now in his happy place, Sasori sat up with a huff and flicked Sakura on the forehead. "Has it ever occurred to you that you might have a savior complex?"

"I do not, I'm just nice!" Sakura cried, rubbing the spot on her forehead with a scowl. "That does remind me, I talked to Itachi for a bit and he isn't as bad as - "

There was a chorus of defeated groans, and all three men jumped up to bury Sakura in a sweaty pile. She wrapped her strong arms around the warm bodies and closed her eyes in contentment. The weight made her sore injuries smart, but Sakura didn't mind it.

Not when she knew they needed her.


End file.
